A couple more candidates have hit the airwaves.  Republican State Senators Mike Delph and Jim Merritt have cut commercials.  Word on the street is Frank Anderson, Merritt’s opponent, is planning a TV buy.  No word yet on whether Delph’s opponent Robin Shackleford will do the same.

Mike Delph Bio from Mike Delph on Vimeo.

The Democrats are abuzz in the blogosphere over the recent revelation that Republican Secretary of State candidate Charlie White did not reside in his Fishers Town Council District and had to resign the post.   The information is politically embarrassing to White who is not only a candidate for the top election officer in the state, but also chairman of the Hamilton County Republican Party.

I can’t blame the Democrats for getting excited, if I was getting ready to take a serious beating on November 2, I’d be happy with whatever victory I could get.   I did speak to White for about half an hour about the incident this week and he admitted to making a “really stupid mistake” and not changing his registration.  He attributes the mistake to a combination of factors, a divorce, problems closing on a new home, dealing with custody issues and running for a statewide office.

I’ve known Charlie for several years, both personally and professionally and I have a hard time believing he would intentionally commit voter fraud, especially when the odds of getting caught are relatively easy.   Now I also don’t think it helps if you’re running for the chief election officer of the state and you make an amateur mistake like this one. And the voters are going to have to make the call as to whether this is a big enough deal to deny him his front-runner status.

On on the other hand, if I were the Democrats I wouldn’t get too excited about White’s misfortune.  First of all, unless you’re going to spend an ungodly amount of money to make this a campaign issue, this story will probably fade into the background noise after this weekend.  Secondly,  Democrat Vop Osili, who I think is a good guy, has also made a couple doozies, that if someone wanted to really be a jerk and make a big deal out of they could.  I don’t think Osili intentionally broke any laws, but his campaign has made some slips ups which when I got word of them, attributed it to people not paying attention and leaving it at that.

And before I forget, if my Democratic friends are going to make an issue out of  the validity of White’s votes while he was on the Fisher’s Town Council but did not live in his district, then I’m sure they won’t have a problem revisiting all the votes cast by former City-County Councilor Patrice Abdullah who did not live in his district when he cast the vote that helped pass the 65-percent county income tax increase.

Did Charlie act stupidly by not paying attention and dotting his “i’s” and crossing his “t’s”? Yup.   Do I think this is fundamentally going to change the dynamics of our political universe, probably not.

I’ve got quite a bit of teaching work to catch up on today, so I am opening up the blog to your political predictions.  With 40 days to go until Election Day, what are your top three predictions?  They can be state, local or federal.  The winner gets bragging rights.  Have fun!

I frankly don’t know which is scarier this video message or the fact that 1st District Republican Congressional candidate Mark Leyva calls himself a Tea Party candidate and he’s filed for bankruptcy.

Just for the record Leyva, filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy about a month before the primaries.   Between 2002 and 2007, Leyva wracked up $131,000 on personal credit cards.  He didn’t start dealing with his creditors until  December 2009.   He hired debt consultants, but ultimately filed for Chapter 7.   And he’s running against Pete Visclosky, of all people.  Go figure.

I have been  covering the Indianapolis City-County Council for six years now.  I have seen the Council do some really smart things, and have some not so brilliant moments.  For the most part, I tend to respect the lot of them, even the ones I don’t agree with.   It’s a job that requires a lot of work and the pay isn’t that great.  However, there is one Councilor who has been talking a lot lately, but saying nothing.  That is Brian Mahern.

I’ve always considered Brian average at best.  On the Democratic side Joanne Sanders is the leader and Jackie Nytes and Mary Moriarty Adams are the ones who know what’s going on with the budget and do most of the work.   However, Brian has never really contributed anything to the body.

His Council webpage says his priorities were dealing with abandoned homes, public safety and infrastructure.   But when I did some checking for original council proposals that Brian has offered only found three.    One was a resolution recognizing a citizen,  one asked the Indiana General Assembly to  give the Council more direct control over the Metropolitan Development Commission, and the third was last night’s posturing over the Metropolitan Police Department.

Mahern offered up a proposal creating an investigative committee into recent actions of IMPD and wanted to move it forward with a full Council vote without going through committee to discuss the details of the proposal, solicit public commentary and fully vet the ordinance.  But I guess when you’re posturing, those details can go by the wayside.

I don’t know what it’s been lately with Brian, but he sure has been talking a lot lately, without saying anything of substance.   It started around the time the Council was considering taking up the smoking ban.  I would like to get to the bottom of all this.    Maybe we can talk soon and with a little bit of luck maybe he’ll say something meaningful.

It’s amazing what happens when you take a few days off.  I was going to try to blog about a couple recent news items, but the Lovely Mrs. Shabazz only allowed me to have twitter and Facebook privileges.  But I did make it a point to keep up on the news and here are my thoughts on a few items of note.  As well as a couple bits of gossip as well.

The Lincoln Plowman indictment does not surprise me.  If you read my post from March 9, I gave you most of the details.  Marion County Democrats are already have the web ads up and running.  If I were them, I wouldn’t get too excited, because there’s word on the street that one of their own elected officials has some of their own trouble on the way.

Speaking of words, I’m told the Mayor’s meeting with the Indianapolis clergy was pretty interesting.  Not so much because of the Mayor and Clergy, but some very public infighting that took place while they were all gathered there.  Apparently the battle over who speaks for whom is continuing to rage and the Mayor was kind of put in the middle of all that.  The Baptist Ministers Alliance of Indianapolis put out   a statement criticizing the meeting, but I have to see one where they announced the job they helped Brandon Johnson’s mother get.

Oh and despite the big flair up this past week over satellite voting, am I the only who is wondering why Marion County Democratic Chairman Ed Treacy sent an attempted murderer to work the polls in 2008 at a satellite vote center.   The record of former poll worker Charles Hayes became a point of contention in last week’s back and forth between Marion County Clerk Beth White and GOP Chairman Tom John.  White said the poll worker in question was sent by the Democratic party, which makes me wonder is any over there doing background checks on these guys.

And since we’re on the subject of ex-offenders,  the guys over at Indianapolis Political Stock Exchange have hypothesizes that John is trying to take over the “ex-offender” world by having his wife who serves as deputy director of the agency.    Full disclosure, I serve on the PACE Board, as well as do a lot of other people from different backgrounds.  Nobody has the time to engineer this master takeover plan, because we’re all too busy trying to put people to work.  And shameless plug time, the agency just got a $268,000 federal grant from the Obama administration to help in those efforts.  Who knew Republicans had that much pull?

As the city wants to figure out what to do about it’s proposed parking deal, a recent petition taken out showed several downtown business owners were in opposition to it.   Something that didn’t get a lot of press was that the petition called for the city to “every effort to effective public transportation.”   I’m trying to figure out what that means.

Contrary to popular opinion City Controller David Reynolds is not deserting a sinking ship.  Reynolds is leaving the city to go work for the State Senate as Chief Fiscal Analyst November 1.   I know it’s a position Reynolds has always wanted and the Senate figured out if he can turn around Indianapolis’ fiscal crisis and turn a projected $200 million deficit into a $55 million rainy day fund, he can probably help Indiana navigate its waters too.

And speaking of Legislature, my very reliable sources are telling me Indiana House Democrats are looking at taking a thumping this upcoming election season.  If that happens don’t be surprised if you see State Representative Chet Dobis of Merryville take over as Minority Leader.  He’s reportedly been making calls to members of the caucus lobbying for the position.

Although things look very good poll wise for Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dan Coats, I’m hearing Democrat Brad Ellsworth may get the last shot, pardon the expression, with an endorsement from the National Rifle Association, because of his record on guns.  Stay tuned to that one.

I’m still trying to get my arms around the whole Capital Improvement Board, Indiana Convention and Visitors Association, property tax issue.  Give me a day or two to make some calls.  I’ll have a separate post this week.

That’s all for now.  It’s nice to be back but we have a ton of laundry to do.  So, time to get cleaning!

The lovely Mrs. Shabazz and I are packing up today and hitting the road for parts somewhat unknown.  It’s part honeymoon/road trip/family member’s wedding.  And although I promised to be a good husband, my wife promised to let me do one of my jobs while I am away.

So I do plan to post, just every other day.  I’ve had some ideas in mind for a while on the state of local and state politics that I’ve been meaning to write.  So while she’s tanning by the water, I’ll be blogging with a scotch and water.  Check back in a day or two and try to behave yourselves.

Although support for the Mayor’s current plan to privatize parking in downtown Indianapolis has hit a stumbling block, I think there is a viable alternative to moving forward which would accomplish the main goals of modernizing parking and building infrastructure.

Instead of privatizing the parking, I politely suggest the city can keep control of it and float revenue bonds tied to the meter revenue as a way to repair streets.   Due to the administration’s good fiscal management Indianapolis has a AAA bond credit rating,  so it should be able to get a good rate on the bonds.  With new hotels coming on-line and tourism continuing to grow there will be a steady stream of clientele using the meters,  and the local companies that would be helping the city in the original deal can still stay involved.

And since money from parking meters by law must used in the areas where the meters are, the city doesn’t have to use revenue from the Citizens Gas deal for areas where there are meters and instead the meter revenue can be a self-generating fund.  And to make sure no one plays games with the dollars, the City could create a trust fund similar to major moves.

Now the city would still have to overcome a couple of hurdles.  It would have to convince potential bond buyers that the parking meters could generate the necessary revenue to cover their investments.  In the past, the parking meters have brought in about $1 million annually.   The city could float general obligation bonds, but that would put property tax payers on the hook.

Oh, and rates will still have to go up.  They have stayed the same since 1974 and I can guarantee you the costs of maintaining the streets and sidewalks hasn’t.  And for the business people who may have an issue with the rate increases, I have to ask you if you are still charging the same prices from 36 years ago?

I think this is a viable alternative to the current proposal, which has caused more of a stir than I frankly think it is worth.  The city can achieve its goals of fixing infrastructure without relying on property taxes and keep full control of  its parking meters.

If this doesn’t work for you, I’ll be glad to post your suggestions.

Republican Mark Massa is hitting the airwaves for a second time with an ad in his race for Marion County Prosecutor.   I’ve embedded it in this post.  And for the record, in the interest of fairness, I will be more than happy to post an ad by the Terry Curry campaign should one become available.

I have always believed the anniversary of 9-11 can bring out the best in people and the absolute worst.   This year I got to personally experience some of the worst.  During a Twitter exchange I had someone tell me that the United States should round up all Muslims and send them back to their homelands.   I asked him what about those of us who were born here, like me and those who converted, like my parents in the 1960s?  His response was that it didn’t matter, they should all go back to where they came from.  You will be pleased to know that I will be moving back to Chicago immediately, not.

I bring this up, because for some strange reason this 9-11 anniversary was different than most.  It’s a somber occasion, but it’s also an opportunity to marvel at the human spirit and remember the men and women who are fighting to keep us free from harm.   There was a vitriol in the air this year that hearkened me back to stories of my grandparents in the South in the turn of the century.  And to be honest, I really do think a lot of the anti-Islamic sentiment in this country is rooted in good old-fashioned racism.

Lets be honest, we have a history in this country of singling out certain groups of people to scapegoat and direct our fear and anxiety;  Blacks, Hispanics, Catholics, Irish, Jews, Native Americans, Germans, Japanese, Gays, etc.   Luckily it’s just a phase we go through until enough people with common sense come along and we realize what we’re doing is ridiculous.

Now I freely admit to being a bit liberal with the Islamic faith, because I am not giving up my bacon, martinis or cigars for anybody.  And I also think that if I had to live in a place with no alcohol or naked women I’d seriously consider becoming a suicide bomber too.  However the thought of 70+ virgins waiting for me in heaven really isn’t all that appealing because if they couldn’t get lucky on Earth, why would I want to touch any of that in the afterlife?  So I’d likely take a pass on blowing somebody up.  Instead, I’d spending my days working on reform and modernizing the faith.

It would also help if the people on the other side doing the yelling and screaming would actually read a Koran from cover to cover before talking about it or when referring to Shira law, they specify which version; there are a number of them in case you didn’t know.    I also love the people who make the ridiculous argument of wanting to build a church in Mecca,  because I’m sure that will happen when the atheists get a storefront in Vatican City.  And as far as that Florida church that was going to burn the Koran as a form of protest, might I suggest a cross next time because at least there wouldn’t be any mistake about what their real agenda was.   Sheets would be optional.

Anyway, as much as I thought the individual who tweeted me was a complete tool, I don’t shy away from people with serious questions looking for meaningful understandings.  That’s why I am always willing to engage in a meaningful discussion.   But as we move forward and the 10th anniversary of 9-11 is 51 weeks and a couple days away, I hope we can grow up a little bit in this country and have grown up discussions and solve problems like adults.  We’ve done it before and I think we can do it again.

And as for the guy who told me to go back where I came from, I am taking some time off this week, so I’ll try to stop in the Chi-town if  I can get the change.   There’s a bar downtown I’ve been meaning to get back to forever.

Asalaam Alaikum!!!